|
home / centre for automotive safety research / Publications / List / Details Publication Details| Title | An inexpensive technical solution for studying vehicle separations within real traffic flows | | Authors | Mackenzie JRR, Dutschke JK | | Year | 2015 | | Type | Conference Paper | | Abstract | Quantifying the separation between vehicles, both laterally and longitudinally, is an important step to understanding some crash events. Examples include, crashes that occur during the various phases of overtaking manoeuvres on high speed roads (pull out, pass, pull in) or where vehicles are passing bicycles on an adjacent travel path. The paper investigates a new option for measuring separation distance using inexpensive LASER distance measuring (LIDAR) devices. Six LIDAR devices were fitted to a vehicle and the accuracy of measurements to another vehicle during an overtaking manoeuvre were evaluated with off-the-shelf differential GPS technology. Data from the LIDAR devices was also used to calculate the passing speed and length of the overtaking vehicle, and the accuracy of these calculations was evaluated. Preliminary results show that the setup delivers results that are acceptable up to distances of 50 meters and at passing speeds up to 20 km/h. This inexpensive solution will facilitate research where separation distance in real traffic flow is an important consideration. Effective use of the technology should take into account possible weaknesses such as inaccurate device positioning and the potential for spurious data. | | Conference Name | Australasian Road Safety Conference | | Conference Abbreviation | ARSC2015 | | Conference Location | Gold Coast, Queensland | | Conference Date | 14-16 October 2015 |
| Reference | | Mackenzie JRR, Dutschke JK (2015). An inexpensive technical solution for studying vehicle separations within real traffic flows. Australasian Road Safety Conference, Gold Coast, Queensland, 14-16 October 2015. |
|
